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Making a recording

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Glenn

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I hope this is the correct slot to ask a question on recording.
My question is a general one with a bit of a specific twist.

The general question is: what is your recording set-up for recording a solo accordion?

The specific bit is as follows:
I have a Zoom H4n Handy Portable Digital Recorder (http://www.amazon.com/Zoom-Handy-Portable-Digital-Recorder/dp/B001QWBM62[/url]).
Indeed it is handy and dead easy to use. My issue is there is always a fair bit of hiss-noise which I cant seem to get rid of. Any suggestions?
 
Do you have any music software such as Cubase,Audigy,Cakewalk or similar ?

Do you download from Zoom H4N onto your PC and in what format ...WAV,MP3 MP4 etc ?

Can you "Master" in or with the Zoom .

I suspect not. I have heard brilliant recordings from these machines on music sites after they have been mastered and any unwanted noise eradicated.

Audacity is a freeware music software app you may want to try out..........you may need to download a Zoom program Manager as well.....I had a Zoom MRs 8,superb piece of kit ....but to use it on the pc you had to convert it's files to Wavs and MP3 via the Manager Prog....things may have moved on ......try Audacity.

The only caveat that I would make about the H4N is that it is possibly mostly intended for in field recording as aportable device,for gigs etc more of a notebook ........But it is a useful bit of kit....
 
Glenn said:
I hope this is the correct slot to ask a question on recording.

My issue is there is always a fair bit of hiss-noise which I cant seem to get rid of. Any suggestions?

I’ve got an Zoom H2 and don’t have any problems with hiss. It sound to me like you haven’t set the record input gain up high enough. On mine H2, there’s 3 analogue input levels and a digital one, worth checking out..
 
The H4N is a 4 track recorded with a stereo microphone pair and option for external microphones (eg. XLR - even has phantom power).
The files are written to SD as .wav files at different qualities.
I normally make a copy on my PC and use Audacity to cut out the useless bits.
It came with a free version of Cubase Light which works fine but is a bit of a complex beast and perhaps overkill for me.
The noise issue I allude to is not that bad. I do have a good recording level but it is never "very" quiet.
Maybe I'm dreaming and such total silence is not possible.
I also think I record with the H4n too close to the accordion so I head the key clacks and the finger noise.
That should be easily solved by placing the recorder further away. It's just handy that I can reach over and start/stop the thing without having to get up and down (pure laziness I know).
 
If you use the Eq tool you should be able to eliminate the unwanted hiss.....put a recording on Soundcloud and lets have a listen or emailan mp3 to me......
 
Thanks Jarvo,
I'll do that this weekend. Just to get a sort of baseline for what I'm doing right and wrong.
 
Glenn said:
I hope this is the correct slot to ask a question on recording.
My question is a general one with a bit of a specific twist.

The general question is: what is your recording set-up for recording a solo accordion?

The specific bit is as follows:
I have a Zoom H4n Handy Portable Digital Recorder (http://www.amazon.com/Zoom-Handy-Portable-Digital-Recorder/dp/B001QWBM62[/url]).
Indeed it is handy and dead easy to use. My issue is there is always a fair bit of hiss-noise which I cant seem to get rid of. Any suggestions?

Glen,

Im a little over the top. I have a Roland 8x with the best type of microphone...none! The electronic sound goes through my Roland V100 (A/D converter) and the recording media is Sonar X2, soon to be X3 DAW on my computer. No hiss, no room noise, in fact I could record using MIDI and correct those extremely rare mistakes in my playing :oops:, then play it back on the 8x (including the bellow parameters) and then finally record the audio.

Walt
 
That is a great advantage of synth based instruments but I am stuck with recording an analogue device with all its drawbacks.
 
Get yourself a copy of pro tools and an audio interface and a good mic and all the hiss will be gone
 
There shouldn’t be any hiss with a loud source (accordion), with a Zoom H4. It sounds like the input levels are too low. I get no hiss with my H2..
 
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